TOMPAINE.COM IMUS WATCH: Barney Frank Chastises Imus (and Those Who Go on His Show)

 

Week of April 17-21st.

Philip Nobile is the editor of Judgment at the Smithsonian, which printed the banned Smithsonian script on the 50th anniversary of the Bombs of August in 1995.

Editor's Note: TomPaine.com continues its coverage of radio host Don Imus. Imus has maintained that his show does not make a practice of airing racially offensive material. TomPaine.com has monitored the show for four weeks and found that the show regularly features offensive cracks about blacks, gays, and foreigners. Click here to read our first report (March 20-24th), second report (April 3-7th) and third report (April 10-14th).

Among the disturbing comments recorded on this week's Imus Watch is a slur on Representative Barney Frank. Asked about Imus's homophobic statement, Frank said that he was bothered more by the show's "degrading" racist comments. "I'm disappointed that the people who go on the show treat Imus like a friend. They're wrong not to confront him. I hope that Tim Russert says something to him."

This is the fourth week of Mr. Nobile's Imus coverage.

PARTICIPANTS

Rob Bartlett [comedian]

Don Imus [host]

Patrick McEnroe [sports]

Bernard McGuirk [producer]

Lou Ruffino [engineer]

HOMOPHOBIC REMARKS

Rob Bartlett: So I heard you want to learn Spanish?

Imus: Yeah.

Bartlett: You don't really need to know that many phrases, do you?

Imus: Well...

Bartlett: Gracias por la offerta...maricon. Thank you for the offer, but I'm not homosexual. [laughter]

********

Imus: So I say to McEnroe, what happened, Jim Currier is on McEnroe's, the Hampton, ah...

McEnroe: The New York Hampton.

Imus: Yeah, the Hampton homos, or whatever the name ...

********

Voice imitating Richard Nixon: [Al Gore] hasn't held a press conference in twenty-five years. Now that he's got the nomination locked up they're so afraid that he'll step on his -- you should excuse the term -- dick that I think Tony Coelho must have slapped one of those rubberball homo gags on him or something.

Imus: No, no, no.

********

Voice imitating Manuel Noriega: Isn't this the same Bigfoot-looking bimbo who hickory smoked those Branch Davidians a couple of years ago? Well, where's the cojones now, Janet? And I know jew [pronunciation of you] got them, not just in the figurative sense...and jew roll over like some maricon at a Manilow concert...I'm giving it [i.e., "the bird"] to Janet Reno...If jew were in charge, I'd still be on a mound of feather pillows in a four-thousand-foot bedroom suite with a bunch of big-breasted, $1500 dollar-a-night hookers. And from what I understand, jew probably would have been right there with me. [played three times]

********

Voice imitating Walter Cronkite: ...Mr. [Rick] Kaplan unbelievably has stayed overnight at the White House again...This time around after listening to Mr. Clinton knock'em dead at the Radio and Television Correspondents Association Dinner, Kaplan went to the home of the leader of the free world where he bedded down in the Queen's Room, appropriately it seems to me, while his twenty-one year old daughter slept in the Lincoln Bedroom. [played twice]

********

Voice imitating Rush Limbaugh: George W. met with a group of gay Republicans in a closed door session. I don't know what's more troubling, the fact that he's actually agreed to meet with gays or that it was a closed door session...even though he's consented to this meeting of the 'mo minds, his positions would remain intact. But now in light of the sissy summit the suggestion that W. wants to have it both ways is a statement that takes on a decidedly disturbing double meaning...Why must I be left with a mental image of George Junior playing ring toss in a hot tub with a group of sweaty Log Cabin Republicans? Or discussing the Sondheim oeuvre in front of a roaring fire roasting weenies with a bunch of all-beef Barney Franks? [laughter] He's gone on record saying that gays are not fit to be parents. Well, as any man who's endured a prostate exam knows, the term not fit is quite a`propos. Even if a fit could be forced, procreation remains a bological impossibility. So at its essence the statement can still hold truth without being perceived as homophobic. But should Bush temper his position even slightly he will be accused of doing a 180, turning his back, rolling over, all phrases that could be used to describe Betty Davis Night at the Manhole in Greenwich Village. [laughter]

********

Voice imitating Bill Clinton: [excerpt from the "Bill Clinton's Diary"] Dear Diary -- I just read Peggy Noonan's new book, The Case Againt Hillary Clinton. I have to say, ew boy, this is some pretty nasty stuff.... I read about two pages before I immediatelly called the publisher to option the film rights. We've got to get this picture greenlighted, made and released by November. All we need to do is lock up the right actress to play Hillary, somebody really unlikable and difficult to take for more than two or three minutes at a time. I wonder who Ellen Degeneres is signed with.

Imus: Shut up.

Clinton: Love, Bubba.

RIDICULE OF AFRICAN-AMERICANS

McEnroe: Seventeen points for [San Antonio Spurs center] David Robinson, who by the way took a vicious, and I mean vicious, elbow from [L.A. Lakers center] Shaquille O'Neal in over time.

McGuirk: There you go, showing his true colors...He should be on the Knicks. He's nothing but a car-jacker in shorts himself...He's a bag of dirt.

********

McEnroe: The New York Knicks will take on Toronto in round one, the Vince Carter-led Raptors giving the Knicks all sorts of match-up problems in winning three out of four from New York this season. Are the Knicks scared of Toronto? Here's Knicks forward, Larry Johnson.

Johnson: That's a mental boost ourselves, knowing that these guys are capable of doing big things.

McGuirk: Mental boost is a "See, John Run" book for you. [sustained laughter]

McEnroe: That's terrible. [more laughter]

********

McGuirk: You gotta motivate these thugs [the Orlando Magic], not cry in front of them [referring to Magic coach Doc Rivers' emotional press conference follwing his team's elimination from from the NBA playoffs]....

McEnroe: ...Just listen to the reaction of [Magic] point guard Darrell Armstrong after the game.

Armstrong: [emotional voice] ...We worked so hard, we worked so hard.

McEnroe: That tape has not been doctored.

Imus: You can't be cryin' when you're forty and forty-one.

McGuirk: You gotta be pulling out box cutters, not hankies, out of your pocket...Be glad you have a job, shut up...be glad you're not a security guard at the Orlando Arena or whatever the hell it is. [laughter]...

Ruffino: At the O-rena. [laughter]

McGuirk: Let me see your ticket. [laughter]

Imus: When you're O-hab. [laughter]

McGuirk: Then you'd be cryin'. [laughter] When that bus comin' so I can get home [in "black" accent]. [laughter] That's something to cry about. [laughter]

********

[Taped promo with previously broadcast soundbites]

Imus: Jayson Williams, good morning, Mr. Williams?

McGuirk: [imitating the New York Nets forward] How you doin', Imus man?

Imus: I'm fine, Jayson. Well, first of all how you votin' in the strike situation?

McGuirk: I'm votin' yes, man. I need a job, man, want to get back to work, yo. Imus man, if I don't get back on the job, man, can I work to be your nanny? [laughter] Take care of the baby and your wife at the same time [laughter]. You know what I'm sayin'?

Voice imitating Rush Limbaugh: If your radio sounds funny in the morning, you're listening to "Imus in the Morning."

Imus: So here's the thing I'm wondering, how did you all manage to elect somebody like Patrick Ewing to head the Players [Union]? What was that all about?

McGuirk: Patrick Ewing, he thinks arbitration is something that Marv Albert does in a hotel room. [laughter] You know what I'm sayin'? It's crazy man. He don't belong being president of a prisoners' union, man. [laughter] Players union, man, I ain't havin' that, man. Crazy. He wasn't even goin' to let us vote. You know what I'm sayin'? I called him up. I said, 'Look punk, you ain't back in Haiti.* And Lincoln done freed the slaves. [laughter] We better vote [laughter], man.' I'll punch him right in his bag-ass mouth, Imus man. You know what I'm sayin', man? [*Ewing was born in Jamaica.]

********

McGuirk: I went to dinner with [former Imus sports reporter Mike] Breen. And [former Knicks guard John] Starks happened to be in my seat until I threw the bitch out. [laughter] How about getting me a cold beer, Mr. Starks?

Imus: Everytime [Oprah] opens her mouth, she reveals herself to be essentially what she is -- almost John Rocker without the baseball cap [laughter]...

McGuirk: [to Oprah] Shut up, fat, flatulent cow.

ETHNIC RIDICULE

Voice imitating Manuel Noriega: Did you see [Gloria] Estafan make her big political statement the other day urging the U.S. goverrnment not to return Elian to his father? She can't be serious with that [muted], can she? I mean this little Chihuahua-looking ho wins a coupla Grammys and right away think she's a Cuban-American diplomat.

Editor's Note: "Imus in the Morning" is broadcast on the radio by Infinity Broadcasting, a division of CBS, and telecast by MSNBC, a joint venture of NBC and Microsoft.

Published: May 08 2000